Emergency Vehicle Prioritisation

Brisbane City Council in partnership with the Queensland Government, is delivering innovative traffic management technology. This technology will help emergency services across Brisbane get to their destinations faster. This saves valuable time and potentially lives. Council contributed $0.5 million to the jointly funded project. 

Emergency Vehicle Priority (EVP) systems provide emergency services vehicles with a passage of green lights on route to an emergency. As the vehicle approaches a busy intersection the lights will be green. This ensures our city’s ambulances and fire and rescue vehicles move efficiently and safely through traffic signals.

The initiative involves installing devices into emergency vehicles then linking them to GPS and traffic management technology. This determines:

  • the location of an emergency vehicle
  • calculates estimated times of arrival at intersections
  • sends a message to the traffic control system that an emergency vehicle is approaching
  • allows the lights to turn green and stay on longer, ensuring traffic can clear an intersection efficiently.

The EVP rollout has connected more than 300 intersections across 13 Brisbane road corridors. There are plans to expand the rollout.

EVP devices have been fitted to around 140 Brisbane ambulance vehicles and 30 fire rescue vehicles.

The technology is rolling-out progressively and each location monitored to ensure it is operating efficiently.

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